Olive Oatman (September 7, 1837 – March 21, 1903) was an American woman whose life became a symbol of cultural encounters in the American West.?
She is known for being captured by Native Americans as a teenager, living among them for several years, and later returning to white society with a distinctive chin tattoo.
In 1851, Olive was traveling with her family from Illinois to California as part of a religious group.
?While crossing the Arizona desert, they were attacked by a Native American tribe.
?Most of her family, including her parents and siblings, were killed.?
Olive and her younger sister, Mary Ann, were taken captive and endured harsh conditions for about a year.
The sisters were eventually traded to another group, believed to be the Mojave people.?
While with them, Olive was adopted by a tribal leader and his wife, who provided her with care and stability.?
As part of their customs, the Mojave tattooed her chin with traditional markings, a sign of acceptance within their community.
Unfortunately, Mary Ann did not survive long after their transfer, likely due to starvation caused by a severe drought.?
Olive, however, remained with the Mojave for nearly five years. While some accounts suggest she was treated well,
?much of her experience remains a mystery, shaped by the biases of the time.
Rumors of a “white girl” living among the Mojave eventually reached American settlers.?
In 1856, a negotiation led by Royal B. Stratton secured Olive’s release,
?and she returned to mainstream society. Her story captivated the public,
?and she became widely known, though she rarely spoke about her experiences.
After being taken into Mohave custody, the girls walked for days to a Mohave village along the Colorado River (in the center of what today is ). They were immediately taken in by the family of a tribal leader (kohot) whose non-Mohave name was Espaniole. The Mohave tribe was more prosperous than the group that had held the girls captive, and both Espaniole's wife, Aespaneo, and daughter, Topeka, took an interest in the Oatman girls' welfare. Oatman expressed her deep affection for these two women numerous times over the years after her captivity.:?93?
Aespaneo arranged for the Oatman girls to be given plots of land to farm. A Mohave tribesman, Llewelyn Barrackman, said in an interview that Olive was most likely fully adopted into the tribe because she was given a Mohave nickname, something only presented to those who have fully assimilated into the tribe. Olive herself would later claim that she and Mary Ann were held captive by the Mohave and that she feared to leave, but this statement could have been colored by the Reverend Royal Byron Stratton, who sponsored the publication of Olive's captivity narrative shortly after her return to White society. For example, Olive did not attempt to contact a large group of whites that visited the Mohaves during her period with them,:?102? and years later she went to meet with a Mohave leader, , in and spoke with him of old times.:?176–77?
Anthropologist wrote in an article about the Oatman captivity: "The Mohaves always told her she could go to the white settlements when she pleased but they dared not go with her, fearing they might be punished for having kept a white woman so long among them, nor did they dare to let it be known that she was among them".
Another thing that suggests Olive and Mary Ann were not held in forced captivity by the Mohave is that both girls were tattooed on their chins and arms, in keeping with the tribal custom. Oatman later claimed (in Stratton's book and in her lectures) that she was tattooed to mark her as a slave, but this is not consistent with the Mohave tradition, where such marks were given only to their own people to ensure that they would enter the land of the dead and be recognized there by their ancestors as members of the Mohave tribe.:?78? The tribe did not care if their slaves could reach the land of the dead, however, so they did not tattoo them. It has also been suggested that the evenness of Olive's facial markings may indicate her compliance with the procedure.:?78?
Olive Oatman's 1860s lecture notes tell of her younger sister often yearning to join that better "world" where their "Father and Mother" had gone. Mary Ann died of starvation while the girls were living with the Mohave. This happened in about 1855–56, when Mary Ann was ten or eleven. It has been claimed that there was a drought in the region,:?105? and that the tribe experienced a dire shortage of food supplies, and Olive herself would have died had not Aespaneo, the matriarch of the tribe, saved her life by making a gruel to sustain her.:?98?
Olive later spoke with fondness of the Mohaves, who she said treated her better than her first captors. She most likely considered herself assimilated. She was given a clan name, Oach, and a nickname, Spantsa, a Mohave word having to do with unquenchable lust or thirst.:?73–74? She chose not to reveal herself to white railroad surveyors who spent nearly a week in the Mohave Valley trading and socializing with the tribe in February 1854.:?88? Because she did not know that Lorenzo had survived the massacre, she believed she had no immediate family, and the Mohave treated her as one of their own.:?99?
Release
When Olive was 19 years old, Francisco, a messenger, arrived at the village with a message from the authorities at . Rumors suggested that a white girl was living with the Mohaves, and the post commander requested her return, or to know the reason why she did not choose to return. The Mohaves initially sequestered Olive and resisted the request. At first they denied that Olive was even white. Over the course of negotiations some expressed their affection for Olive, others their fear of reprisal from whites. The messenger Francisco, meanwhile, withdrew to the homes of other nearby Mohaves; shortly thereafter he made a second fervent attempt to persuade the Mohaves to part with Olive. Trade items were included this time, including blankets and a white horse, and he passed on threats that the whites would destroy the Mohaves if they did not release Olive.:?106?
After some discussion, in which Olive was this time included, the Mohaves decided to accept these terms, and Olive was escorted to in a 20-day journey. Topeka (the daughter of Espianola/Espanesay and Aespaneo) went on the journey with her. Before entering the fort, Olive was given Western clothing lent by the wife of an army officer, as she was clad in a traditional Mohave skirt with no covering above her waist. Inside the fort, Olive was surrounded by cheering people.:?111?
Olive's childhood friend Susan Thompson, whom she befriended again at this time, stated many years later that she believed Olive was "grieving" upon her forced return because she had been married to a Mohave man and had given birth to two boys.:?152?
Olive, however, denied rumors during her lifetime that she either had been married to a Mohave or had been sexually mistreated by the Yavapai or Mohave. In Stratton's book, she declared that "to the honor of these savages let it be said, they never offered the least unchaste abuse to me." However, her nickname, Spantsa, may have meant "rotten womb" and implied that she was sexually active, although historians have argued that the name could have different meanings.:?73–74?
Within a few days of her arrival at the fort, Olive discovered that her brother Lorenzo was alive and had been looking for her and Mary Ann. Their meeting made headline news across the West.:?119–12
Olive later settled in the southwestern United States, marrying John B. Fairchild in 1865.
?She lived a quiet life until her death at age 65 on March 21, 1903.?
Though her story has been interpreted in many ways, her time with the Mojave?
and the tattoo she bore remained the most enduring symbols of her extraordinary life. |
Beck G